February 5, 2010 | Read Time: 2 minutes
- With Bill Gates starting his own blog, officials at his foundation should do the same to share their thoughts about grant making, says Philippe Boucher, a health advocate. On his blog, Mr. Boucher tracks efforts to curb smoking in Africa and says the Gates foundation needs to be more public about its programs to decrease tobacco consumption.
- Can Pepsi’s Refresh Project, which uses crowdsourcing to pick grant recipients, avoid the problems of a similar competition held recently by JPMorgan Chase? Nathaniel Whittemore, founder of Northwestern University Center for Global Engagement, says that early signs are good: Pepsi, for example, will have a “leaderboard” showing in real time which charities are leading the pack.
- Mr. Whittemore also highlights a post on the Harvard Business Review Web site by Umair Hasque, director of the Havas Media Lab, who reminds readers that the Pepsi Refresh project is a marketing effort, and says that “merely investing marketing dollars in worthwhile causes can never make up for something as economically meaningless as selling sugar-water.
- To promote the importance of improving nonprofit governance and operations, Tides, a grant maker and advocacy group in San Francisco, has started a new blog titled, “Why Does Infrastructure Matter?”
- To shore up a dire financial situation, Idealist, a nonprofit job and information network, issued an emergency appeal recently. On her blog, Neil Edgington, a charity consultant, questions this move, saying the group needs to clarify its long-term plans and how it’ll avoid similar problems in the future to reassure donors. Ami Dar, founder of Idealist, responds in the comments section of her blog.
- A new sense of “civic entrepreneurship” is growing in America as government, business, and nonprofit officials are embracing new ideas to create social change, says Stephen Goldsmith, former mayor of Indianapolis and chairman of the Corporation for National and Community Service, on the Social Edge. Mr. Goldsmith has written a new book on the topic.
- In sharp contrast with last year’s World Economic Forum, the 2010 meeting returned to discussions about how businesses can produce social change, writes Marcia Stepanek, a blog writer for Just Means. “Social enterprise and social innovation are no longer considered annoying niche concepts by Establishment Business,” she says.
